LSBU students visit America to experience their school nursing services

09 July 2013

Two LSBU school nursing students recently took a trip to America to see how their services run in a payable healthcare environment in comparison to NHS services.

Lyn and Liliana visited the Winter Park Health Foundation and Orange County Public Schools and they have given an account of their experiences and why this was important to them as school nurses.

Lyn Glover, School Nurse and Student at LSBU:

"As school nurses we are encouraged to explore innovative ways of health promotion and meeting the needs of children and young people. The SCPHN course at LSBU allows the student school nurse to observe different practices in different areas."

We were aware that other countries had school nurses and wanted to see how they used the school nursing service.

Winter Park Health Foundation and Orange County Public Schools very kindly agreed to show us around their schools and the health promotion that they have to offer. We were amazed by the clinics (the size of a mini walk-in centre) attached to the local high school, which serves a population of over 3000 students. We were also introduced to other services such as the Teen Express, which was a clinic on wheels. This was funded by Nemours hospital and would offer health services at school for clients that were unable to access clinics elsewhere."

Liliana Ferreira, Paediatric Nurse and Student at LSBU:

"Our decision to visit a school nursing service in America was firstly to explore the impact of payable healthcare on the provision and infrastructure of public health services compared to free health care provided by the NHS in the United Kingdom. America has similar health priorities in regards to child health and therefore we wanted to learn about the different public health initiatives that were being implemented to tackle these health needs and bring some of those ideas back to practice in England."

Given that healthcare is payable in America, access to healthcare services is sometimes difficult for those who are economically disadvantaged. The public health services such as the school nursing service which is funded through the local education authority and supplemented through private organisations. The services aim is to target those without health insurance, provide front-line healthcare such as diagnosis of minor illnesses and medicine prescriptions through school based health centres to ensure that basic health care can be accessible to all children and young people and support children's recovery so that they can return back to school more quickly."